It's been possible for a long time to connect the Firefox Developer Tools to Firefox for Android so you can debug your mobile website. Until now, though, this was a fairly complex and error-prone process. From Firefox 36 we've made the process much simpler: in particular, you don't need to deal directly with the adb tool at all. Now you connect using the WebIDE, which takes care of setting up adb behind the scenes.

This guide's split into two parts: the first part, "Prerequisites" covers stuff you only need to do once, while the second part, "Connecting", covers stuff you need to do each time you connect the device.

ADB Helper

Your desktop Firefox also needs to have the ADB Helper add-on, version 0.7.1 or higher. This should be installed for you automatically the first time you open the WebIDE. To check the version, type about:addons into the browser's address bar and you should see ADB listed.

If you don't have version 0.7.1 or higher, open the "Extra Components" window in WebIDE by clicking on the "Runtimes" menu, then clicking "Install Simulator". You should see an entry for ADB Helper:

Click "uninstall" then "install", and you should now have the latest version.

Setting up the Android device

Next, enable remote debugging in Firefox for Android. Open the browser, open its menu, select "Settings", then "Developer tools" (on some Android devices you may need to select "More" to see the "Settings" option). Check the "Remote debugging" box:

The browser might display a notification reminding you to set up port forwarding, which you can ignore.